


Doctor Who-Mayfly Emper: DUSK

by ThreadbareT



Series: Doctor Who Mayfly Empire [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen, Non-Canon Companions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-01
Updated: 2019-07-01
Packaged: 2020-05-31 17:32:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19430767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThreadbareT/pseuds/ThreadbareT
Summary: That strange adventurer in time and space, the raggedy rubbery man known as the DOCTOR was meant to be showing his young friend Kelly to holiday on an idyllic rural moon in a distant galaxy, but something has taken control of the TARDIS and sent it spiralling off course... to a war scarred world in the universe's darkest hour, a time that is supposed to be sealed off and impossible to reach.Cinderedge is a planet that should not exist. It was one of the countless fronts on which the eternal war was fought, and lost, the planet burned away and sacrificed.Dusk, a young soldier has only ever known the war. He was given a uniform when he was little more than a boy, and has been fighting for his life for nearly five years... Five years stretched out impossibly over seven long decades.Can the Doctor escape this dangerous trap, before history catches up with a planet due to burn?





	Doctor Who-Mayfly Emper: DUSK

PRELUDE

Five figures crept carefully, and slowly through the night, huddled in trench coats and sand coloured uniforms, under olive drab body armour, gasmasks, and helmets. Each wore a leather satchel and carried a stubby, drum barrelled machine gun with a long silencer.  
Dusk walked at the front of the column. Even under his bulky clothes, he managed to look gangly. He was taller than the other soldiers, leaner and more weathered. He had not been caught in the war as long as the rest of his squad, but he had been changed as much as they had now, but he hadn’t learned to hide it as well.  
Dusk paused and crouched by a fragment of a broken wall. The rest of the squad ducked into cover crouching amongst the rubble of the broken factories and crumbling warehouses, watching the clouds of dust swirl through the dead city on the low, bone dry breeze.  
Briggs tapped Dusk on the shoulder, and made distinct signals with his fingers. What is it?  
Briggs was a burly, powerful man. Keen grey eyes stared out from behind his mask. His Lieutenant’s badge was stencilled onto his helmet with spray paint. He stood patiently watching Dusk.  
Something, Dusk gestured, pointing towards the rusting, broken, mangled ruins of the factory at the end of the street. Dusk could not have easily put into the words the feeling that was twisting and squirming at the back of his mind. A distortion in the natural order, a difference in the fabric of the universe.  
Something that did not belong.  
The enemy. They had found them.  
Briggs nodded. He made a flurry of gestures to the other three in their group. Janus, Casper, and Max. Janus and Casper split off to the left with Briggs. Max patted Dusk on the shoulder. She was of a sturdier, more athletic build than Dusk, with darker skin and kinder eyes. She was over a decade older than him, but was the closest to his own age. The touch on his shoulder became a gentle squeeze, and she cocked her head in what was obviously a big-sister look, even through her gas mask.  
Together they crept along the side of the factory, and up to the iron walkway of a fire escape.  
There were three of the enemy’s shock-troopers on the rooftop. Traitor humans in charcoal and black, with bulky armour, and helmets styled after their masters. Each carried a phased energy weapon, a long and unwieldly weapon. They were keeping watch on the activity down in the factory floor.  
A shimmering portal, like a waterfall of light, cast a spectral silver glow over the factory floor. More of the shock-troopers were stepping through the portal, carrying containment cylinders, and stacking them against the wall.  
Max lifted her machine gun, and stared down the sights, drawing a bead on one of the guards. Dusk did the same, nestling the wooden stock to his shoulder, and glanced down the sights, lining them up to the chest of another guard.  
His stomach knotted, his heart thundered in his chest, and ice-cold blood seared his veins. His throat turned to parchment, his gullet felt as though it was full of grit and sand. His finger drew the slack from the trigger, as he crept along the catwalk, lining up a clear shot.  
The shock-trooper looked around, and saw Dusk.  
Dusk pulled the trigger. His gun bucked, with the thud of a silenced burst. Three holes punched through the visor of the shock-trooper and stole his life away. Max fired a burst, cutting down the second guard.  
Dusk turned on his heels, and took aim at the third man. The shock-trooper found his arm first. The tip of the phased-energy gun flashed red, and a beam of energy, a clear distortion in the air, like a tube of heat haze, flashed past Dusk’s ear, boiling the air. Dusk answered with a pull of his trigger. The silenced burst sent the shock-trooper to the floor with a crash.  
For a moment, less than a heartbeat, the world froze. Every breath was held, waiting to hear if the inhuman banshee cries of the Dead City would answer the dinner gong.  
The shock-troopers brought their guns up, and fired up at the walkway. Max rolled into cover, and Dusk scrambled to join her. The shot down at the troops, trying to force them into cover.  
Briggs, Janus, and Casper opened fire from the doorway, ducking into the factory, and gunning the traitors down with a stutter of gunfire.  
As the last of the shock-troops fell, the only sound was the lament of the wind, and the warbling of the portal. Janus ran to the control pedestal for the portal, and swept it with his sonic probe. The controls sparked, and the waterfall of light faded away, leaving the metal frame, power cables, and rotting brickwork.  
Max let her gun hang from the sling. She nodded at Dusk, and he followed her down to the factory floor.  
“This one is alive,” Casper reported, kicking one of the shock troopers.  
Briggs crouched by the trooper, lifted the helmet from a rough faced, battle hardened veteran. He let out a sigh of disgust. “And where did they find you?”  
The shock-troop set his jaw and looked away.  
Janus eased Casper away, and put a self-sealing dressing over the trooper’s wound. “Try not to move, until that has set,” he warned the enemy.  
Dusk inspected the containment cylinders. He wiped the frost from the glass, and stared inside. The thing suspended in the life-support jelly, eternally sleeping, was a shapeless, hairy mass of mossy growths and thorny roots. They carried the sense of not belonging, of trespassing in an alien time and place.  
“Spore pods,” Dusk whispered.  
The name of the weapon made his squad-mates shudder. The nightmare weapons were the reasons that the Dead Cities were dead. They were the root cause of the horrors that infested the ruins.  
He inspected the workbenches. There were empty crates, all of them marked for supplies, with the right tags and paperwork. Some were labelled for rations, others for ammunition, most were medical supplies.  
Max lifted one of the crates. “They were going to put those things in medical supplies, and ship them into the fortress cities.”  
Briggs clenched his fist. “Who was your contact?”  
The shock-troop said nothing.  
“Who?” Briggs demanded, his voice raising.  
“Sir,” Casper said, gently.  
There was a howl on the wind. A primordial cry that echoed through the ruins.  
“See,” Briggs said, staring at the trooper, “this is why you don’t want to make much noise in a Dead City, and why those phase guns of yours are a really, really, bad idea. Any minute now, the Ghoul Plants are going to be shambling in here, looking for food. Unless you want to see what you were planning to do to the Fortress cities, up close, and all too personal, you will come with us, and you will give serious consideration to telling us what you know.” He looked at Dusk. “Rig the portal and these… things with as much explosives as we can spare. We are moving out.”  
*  
The Trooper dragged himself along at a limp, nursing the dressing on his side as he did. With his gauntlets removed and his wrists bound by zip-straps, he was still an imposing figure, with a blunted nose, and scars across his lips. Dusk put a hand on his shoulder to keep the prisoner walking.  
They were in what was left of the waterfront district of the city, at the outer edge. The docks and quaysides were populated by the rotting, rusting hulks of ships, half reduced to slag by the explosions and fires that had flattened most the buildings, to an endless field of rubble and debris.  
Briggs checked the bulky console strapped to his wrist, and tapped open a comms link. “Spire Six, this is Way-Guard Four, we are at location, ready for extraction.”  
Something tugged at Dusk’s awareness.  
He looked back towards the horizon. The smoke from the factory was a dark stain on the dusty sky. His fingers drummed nervously on his gun. In the distance a pair of shambling, shapeless, things slithered along the riverbed, tendrils writhing around them like serpents. Thankfully the Ghoul Plants were too far away to hear them, and too far away to see clearly, to see the bodies collected and eaten alive, mummified in roots and thorns.  
If Dusk never saw the plants again, they would still haunt his nightmares, forever. He knew that. The horrors of war were forever waiting for him, in the quiet moments, the sleepless nights and the lonely seconds when he had nothing else to think on. They were merciless, and would strike without warning.  
“Say again,” Briggs whispered into his console. His tone grew leaden. “Understood.” He turned to his squad. “Our transport has been usurped for another mission. We are on our own until dawn. Defensive watch, settle down, we’ll take it in turns to stand watch.”  
*  
Dusk’s watch the last, before dawn. He sat by the fire, staring into the darkness. He felt, rather than saw, the Trooper’s gaze upon him.  
“You are on the wrong side,” the Trooper said.  
“Why?” Dusk asked, in a low voice. “Because your lot would appreciate me, eh?”  
“No.” The Trooper stretched out. “Because you will all be exterminated.”  
Dusk tossed him a bottle of water. “I’m pretty sure that’s why I’m on the right side.”  
“So was I,” the Trooper confessed. “Until I saw entire planets die in fire. Until I saw them burn us all away. They will get a foothold here one day, and they will burn you too.” The Trooper stared into the flames of the campfire. “Nothing but loyalty can save you.”  
“Yeah,” Max said, sleepily, without opening her eyes, “but you will have to live with that.”  
“At least I will be alive,” the Trooper snorted. “You could join us.”  
“No,” Max said, quietly, but firmly.  
“You should stop this conversation,” Briggs said. “Apart from the fact I am trying to sleep, raised voices are a bad idea in the city. You won’t like the alternative. Unless of course this is a deliberate attempt to keep me awake, in which case you will not find me distracted, or groggy in the morning, but murderous and unforgiving.”  
The Trooper smiled. “Very well. A more pleasant conversation. Why don’t you tell me where you are from?”  
Dusk grimaced, and chose to ignore that.  
The trooper’s smile was victorious.  
“Please just… be quiet,” Dusk said, carefully. “We want to draw as little attention as we can.”  
For a moment there was silence, but for the crackling of the fire.  
Then the night was filled by a storm of wheezing, groaning, whining sounds, and blue flashing lights, that were answered by the screaming calls of the Ghoul Plants.  
  
ONE

Kelly quickened her pace, and followed the Doctor on his lap of the TARDIS control room. He was a blur of activity, in his long coat that was plum, but somehow gave the impression of being grey, plaid trousers, purple dock-worker boots, a waistcoat and shirt that both seemed to be heather grey and lilac. His favourite glasses, the one that made him look like the kid in black and white movies who got sand kicked at him, were perched on the end of his nose, and that fez, the one Kelly was sure had been lost for good in a Jurassic tar pit, was perched on his head (and looking as good as new).  
Kelly was in her twenties, American, with peach soft skin, and strawberry blonde hair. She wore a tweed waistcoat over a pink tee shirt with a cartoon unicorn, a denim skirt, and red canvas trainers. She was bright eyed, good humoured, and keenly interested in just about everything.  
“Wait!” Kelly said, holding up her palms. “So… I’m not the only one you go on these adventures with?”  
The Doctor flashed her a guilty smile. “Well, it’s not so much that, and more I pop over to catch up with some of the friends I made, and the adventures just sort of… happen.” He smiled. “You know how it is. Back in the day I was travelling for months with constant companions, until they got sick of me, or displaced in time, or…”  
He trailed off for a few seconds, and his eyes looked suddenly very old, and very sad. In that moment, the breath he took between his words, Kelly saw too much of the truth. She saw her father after her mother died, after their differences started becoming arguments. With her dad it had been the bar, and it had been women, with the Doctor it was friends, but the pain was the same. They were both afraid of being alone, but also afraid of being close enough to anybody to be hurt again by loss.  
Those dazzling eyes stared at Kelly, full of warmth, wisdom, and humour once more. “Then one day you wake up, and everybody has families, and mortgages, and work…” The Doctor shrugged. “So, when you aren’t available, I go and check on my other friends. Apparently I have a social life now.” He waved a diary at her. “I have one of these. You know, the ones for keeping track of appointments, not the one you record your day in. I’ve given up on that one loads of times. I wrote memoirs instead. I like a good memoir me…”  
“And this guy we are going to see?” Kelly asked.  
“Ah!” The Doctor clapped his hands together. “Clifford. Lovely chap. He has a nice little farming planet. Well, little as far as planets go. Technically it’s an ocean moon orbiting a gas giant, but…”  
The TARDIS shook. The lights flickered then turned an ominous red.  
“I take it,” Kelly said, dryly, “that isn’t good.”  
“No.” The Doctor lunged to throw some switches, but a fountain of sparks exploded from the console under his fingertips. He sucked his fingers and kicked at the switches, scurrying about between the different facets of the console, throwing levers and spinning dials. “No no no no no no no no no…. Oh lummy no!”  
“How can I help?” Kelly shouted.  
The TARDIS bucked and jolted. The time rotors made a strained grating noise, and smoke poured from the great turning wheels of the ceiling.  
“You can’t…” The Doctor backed away from the console. “It’s no good. I can’t do anything about this.” He looked at Kelly. “Sorry. Something else has us under its control.”  
The dials on the console began to move by themselves, adjusting their settings, twisting and flickering.  
“Has that happened before?” Kelly asked.  
“Yes,” the Doctor said, “and… no.” He sat on the steps, and folded his arms. “The short version is, that this shouldn’t be possible.”  
“Okay.” Kelly sat beside him, and put a hand on his arm. “So…”  
“Somebody has control of the TARDIS,” the Doctor said. “It used to happen, because my people, the Timelords would… occasionally… want me to go and interfere somewhere for them. See that a planet joins the Federation on time, or that one of our renegades is stopped from causing trouble. They would nudge me hither and thither so I always found myself in the right trouble. Usually. Sometimes I was needed back home to stand trial, or be held to account, for appearances sake.” He gave Kelly a solemn look. “Except they aren’t around anymore. Somebody else has used their protocols, and is sending us… somewhere.”  
“But we don’t know where?” Kelly asked.  
The Doctor shook his head.  
“Or how?” Kelly ventured.  
The Doctor shrugged. “I’m all for doing the impossible, but this seems rather rude, or threatening, possibly unpleasant.”  
“Or why?” Kelly said.  
The Doctor smiled. “Not the foggiest.”  
“Can we stop it?” Kelly asked.  
“Not without ripping the TARDIS to pieces, and scattering across the vortex with the force of an exploding sun,” the Doctor said. “I think for now, perhaps we should keep that as plan B.”  
“So…” Kelly winced. “What’s Plan A?”  
“Hold on tight,” the Doctor said, “and mind the bumps!”  
*  
Jenn ran across the busy control and command room of Spire Six, and leant over the control console whose holographic display was glowing red. The technician tapped at the controls, shifting the displays to identify the cause of the alarm.  
A thrill of terror crawled over her spine. Jenn winced and tapped the console on her wrist. Admiral Arbary, the Spire’s commanding officer was suddenly at her side, an imposing figure who wore his scuffed and frayed barracks-dress uniform as though it were his finest parade ground issue. He was a jowly, bulldog of a man, with dark eyes, and a shaven scalp, the weight of the world, or many worlds, resting on his shoulders.  
Jenn snapped to attention. “Incoming time vessel sir.”  
“Is it them?” The Admiral asked. “Or one of their factions?”  
Jenn leant past the technician, and adjusted the display. “The signature doesn’t match any enemy vessels sir. It breached the Helix Field in the upper atmosphere, and is coming in for a rough landing. The time engines are struggling and shot, but from their fingerprint…”  
“It’s from Gallifrey,” Arbay said, with a grunt. “A type forty.”  
“The Timelords?” Jenn’s heart lightened. “Are they sending reinforcements? Or an evacuation force?”  
“Probably just orders for more of us to die for their cause,” Arbay said, his tone dark as tar. “We can no doubt keep the wolves from their door for a few more days. Where is it landing?”  
“Sector nine,” Jenn said. She paused. “We have a Talent in the area, sniffing out time corridors and beachheads. I could redeploy them on search and recovery.”  
“Brigg’s squad?” Arbay nodded. “Send word. The Timelord and his ship are priority one.”  
*  
The TARDIS span sickeningly off kilter.  
Kelly clung to the railing as hard as she could, but the force of the spin was trying to throw her across the console room. With his sonic screwdriver between his teeth, the Doctor reached over and clung to her wrist with one hand, the handrail with the other. As the force of the spinning tore the railing from her fingers, and Kelly became weightless, the Doctor held her, in a grip that was both gentle and as tight as iron.  
“What’s happening?” Kelly screamed.  
“MmmmMMMmmMMMMMmm!” The Doctor said, with a mouth full of sonic.  
“Eh?” Kelly asked.  
One of the wall panels fell away as something behind it burst into blue flames and white sparks. Noxious smoke billowed through the console room.  
The Doctor swung Kelly onto the gantry, and snapped a safety harness about her. She clung to the harness and wedged herself against the railing. The Doctor let go, and flew across the room, grabbing the console as he went past. He clung to one of the levers and fired his sonic first at the console, then at the flaming wall panel.  
“Doctor!” Kelly shrieked.  
“Don’t worry!” The Doctor said, in an infuriatingly calm voice. “All that happened is we hit some kind of field effect when we materialised, in orbit around a planet, and we aren’t in orbit any more. It stalled our engines, and we are sort of landing the old fashioned way.”  
“So…” Kelly stared at him. “We’re falling out of space?”  
The Doctor tutted. “Yes, but that makes it sound almost as bad as it is.” He threw some of the switches. “The good news is, I think I have just enough control to not smash us against anything and to glide us down to a nice gentle landing.”  
“Glide?” Kelly spluttered. “How do glide a box?”  
The Doctor look hurt. “Would you rather I said ‘aim our fall so we skip like a stone on water and hopefully not explode’?”  
“And is that likely to work?” Kelly asked, in a very quiet, very soft voice.  
“Geronimo!” The Doctor shouted, hauling on one of the levers.  
There was a loud boom that shook through the TARDIS, as every shelf emptied itself over the floor.  
“Aaaaaaaargh!” Kelly screamed, clinging to her harness.  
  
TWO

The squad crunched their way through the rubble. Briggs caught up with Dusk, and touched his shoulder. How far? He gestured.  
Dusk shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. The wake of the time vessel was straining at the air, pulling at his thoughts, and knotting his muscles so tight his teeth were grinding. It was a constant pain in his head, like a nail being hammered home by a pneumatic drill. He forced himself to keep his composure as he gestured to his commander.  
I don’t know. Dusk answered. He pointed upwards. It’s getting close. We should be able to see it any moment.  
Briggs looked up to the sky. There were some Carrion Gulls flocking in the taller ruins. He stared hard at Dusk. I don’t see it. Are you sure?  
The Ghoul Plants were drawing close, howling and baying. They had certainly sensed the disturbance, and were closing in, seeking their feast.  
The wall of a nearby building exploded, as a spinning blew box flew through it, scattering bricks and rubble like rain. The squad ducked for cover. Dusk grabbed the prisoner, and dragged him away from a deadly chunk of concrete.  
The blue box hit the street, carved a furrow in the paving, and smashed its way through the side of a half collapsed office building.  
Briggs brushed the dirt from his trench coat, and stared at the wound torn through the office building, and another somewhere beyond. Dusk followed his gaze, and got a glimpse of the blue box bouncing off the side of a storm channel, and dropping into the drainage ditch.  
Briggs looked at him.  
Dusk pointed helpfully after the box.  
Between them they dragged their prisoner to his feet, and marched him in the direction of the storm channel.  
*  
The world came to a rest, but Kelly’s head was still spinning. She looked up.  
The Doctor beamed a confident smile at her, as he hopped down from the console. He reached up and felt his fezless hair. “Oh no!”  
“Bad news?” Kelly asked, unbuckling herself and taking a shaky step towards the ground floor.  
The Doctor nodded, scooping the battered headwear from the floor. He puffed it out, gave a sad tut at the ruined hat, and tossed it over his shoulder. “I’ll have to buy in bulk one of these days. Assuming we can get out of here.” He looked at the smouldering mess behind the dislodged panel, and reached in, shoulder deep. He retrieved a long cylindrical array that contained a number of hexagonal crystals, all of which were interlaced with complex circuitry. “Oh… that isn’t a good sign.”  
“Oh?” Kelly enquired.  
“Whatever that energy field was it completely disrupted the psionic navigation matrix, and…”  
Kelly rubbed her head. “It bugged out your computers, and stalled the engines? Does that mean we are marooned?”  
“No…” The Doctor shook his head. “No. Not marooned… probably…possibly.” He put his glasses back on the tip of his nose. “Well, not permanently…”  
“But…” Kelly groaned. “We are stuck while you call for a tow truck?”  
“It just needs to reboot!” The Doctor said. “Well, it needs to do a lot of complex self-repair, but the short version is it needs to reboot. It should only take a few hours, twelve at the most, a day or two if we are really, really, really unlucky…”  
“Which we usually are,” Kelly noted.  
“Yes, but that gives us time to work out what that field was, and shut it down, or find a way around it.” The Doctor clapped his hands. “Want to go see where we landed?”  
“Doctor…” Kelly swallowed the lump at the back of her throat. “Whoever dragged us here… would have known about that field, right?”  
“Ah.” The Doctor froze. “Well, there’s an unpleasant thought.”  
“Could they have done it to trap us here deliberately?”  
“Kelly,” the Doctor said, with forced brightness, “you aren’t making that thought any more pleasant. And… yes… this is feeling very much like a terribly dangerous trap, so, if you wanted to wait here for me, have a cup of tea, and keep an eye on my comic collection, I would be absolutely fine with that. You would be safe here.”  
“But you aren’t likely to be safe out there,” Kelly said, sharply, “are you?”  
“That is looking less and less likely,” the Doctor agreed.  
Kelly hopped to her feet, and grabbed her backpack. She followed the Doctor to the door.  
*  
The morning beyond the TARDIS doors was uncomfortably hot and dusty, even by the standards of the New Mexico summers Kelly was used to. The TARDIS had landed in a deep concrete drainage channel carved through a neighbourhood of densely packed industrial buildings, in varying states of disrepair, but mostly leaning towards bare metal skeletons and piles of rubble. There were craters, bullet holes, and crashed vehicles everywhere.  
A swollen sun hung in a dust coloured sky, beating mercilessly, and relentlessly on the cracked, sand coloured concrete of the channel.  
The Doctor walked to the walls, and felt the stone, he poked at the stain coming from one of the old pipes, and picked up some dirt. He rubbed it between his fingers.  
“Do you know where we are?” Kelly asked.  
The Doctor gave her one of those smiles that usually meant he didn’t want to have to answer that, and dug his hands in his pockets, as he paced around. “Well…” He declared. “Nobody is shooting at us yet, so that’s a good sign.”  
Kelly sighed. “When did we lower our standards to that?” Movement caught her eyes on the far bank, where men in grubby fatigues, trench coats, and armour were approaching. “Don’t speak too soon. They look like soldiers.”  
The Doctor’s frown deepened, new lines furrowing his brow.  
“They must be sweltering in those clothes,” Kelly noted.  
“Smart fabrics,” the Doctor said. “They adjust to the climate, and protect against some of the environmental hazards.”  
Kelly swallowed. “Environmental hazards? And I notice they are wearing gas masks, Doctor.”  
The Doctor nodded, and twirled his sonic screwdriver in his fingers, his frown deepening another couple of notches at the results. “Hmm.”  
“Doctor,” Kelly said, with waning patience. “Are we…in trouble?”  
“No immediate danger, no…” The Doctor said, with a frown. He wasn’t looking at the sonic any more, he was staring at the approaching soldier. There were five of them in the buff and olive uniforms, but it was the sixth, the one in the charcoal and black, who carried no weapons, and had his wrists bound that the Doctor was staring at, intently. “Or at least not from the air.”  
He’s a prisoner, Kelly realised. They are soldiers, and he is their prisoner. Aloud she said: “Are we about to be taken hostage?”  
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” the Doctor muttered. “I think we just landed in a war zone.”  
“And are they the good guys, or the bad guys?” Kelly asked, through the side of her mouth.  
The Doctor stepped forwards, and held up his hands. “Hello! Look, I know it was very inconsiderate of me to drop by and crash in the middle of your battlefield, but… I’m really not your enemy, and…”  
One of the soldiers, the one with a winged motif that Kelly took to be an insignia of rank, knelt and bowed at the Doctor’s feet. “My Lord,” he said, in a solemn, quiet tone, “the Admiral at Spire Six has sent me to escort you to the safety of the defensive line. I know we are hardly the honour guard you would have expected, but…”  
“Spire!” The Doctor clicked his fingers. “A Command Spire?”  
The Officer nodded. “Sir. If you and your boy will accompany us, we will see you safe, and a transport will be sent to retrieve your TARDIS.”  
“His what?” Kelly asked.  
“TARDIS,” the tallest of the soldiers said. He had the word ‘DUSK’ daubed on the side of his helmet, and had some kind of badge on his shoulder, marking him perhaps as an NCO of some kind. He looked at Kelly from behind his gas mask with golden amber eyes. “It’s a type Forty isn’t it? I saw one once, long ago…” He bowed his head. “You had a rough landing. It must have been the Helix field. Are you okay?”  
Kelly nodded. “You… know about TARDISes?”  
“I saw one, once,” the young man repeated. His voice suggested he was around Kelly’s own age, perhaps in his early to mid twenties. “My Lady,” he added, uncertainly. “Are you a Time Lady, or just… the Lord’s retinue?”  
The Doctor beamed. “Oh, she is most certainly my retinue. She carries my authority, and you will assume any question she asks comes from my tongue.”  
There were howls from down the channel.  
“We don’t have time for this!” The prisoner barked. “They heard the crash, and they can smell his machine. We must surely flee!”  
The Doctor stared in the direction of the unearthly calls and howls. “Surely!” He agreed. “Lead on MacDuff!”  
Kelly followed the Doctor’s gaze. Strange shapes, something like a jellyfish crossbred with a tumbleweed, were dragging themselves from the mouth of a sewer and lurching in the direction of the TARDIS. They had serpentine tentacles, barbed with rose-thorns.  
“Doctor?” Kelly asked.  
“Ghoul Plants,” the Doctor said. “Don’t let it get hold of you, don’t let the thorns cut you, and don’t make any noise you can avoid. Be as quiet as you can.”  
Kelly nodded.  
The Doctor put his sonic in his pocket, and pointed for them to follow the soldiers. The prisoner sneered hatefully at the Doctor. The Doctor smiled back, and mimed doffing a hat. He stepped over to the officer, ‘BRIGGS’ according to his uniform, and made some rapid gestures with something that was not American Sign Language. There was a quick response. Dusk took the lead, and spent a few seconds looking at their options, before he pointed to a stairway some distance down the channel.  
Kelly walked briskly, staying as close to the Doctor as she could.  
His eyes were a thousand miles away. His smile had faded away to a grimace of concern.  
  
THREE

Kelly grew to resent the silence, as the long hours stretched on, under the furnace heat of the sun. She grew sick of having only her own thoughts for company, and of the fear that hung over the eerie city like a miasma.  
Dusk held up a hand.  
At once the squad sought cover, ducking behind the rusting hulks of something that had once been some kind of truck (apparently without wheels). The Doctor grabbed Kelly, gently guided her down by the cab. Briggs and Dusk had dragged the prisoner to the tail end of the truck.  
There was a maybe four or five yards of clear ground until the next vehicle, where Janus and Casper were watching the debris field down the sights of their guns. And a little further back Max was pressed into a doorway.  
The leathery birds stopped circling overhead and settled on sagging, lopsided roof of a building.  
At the trailer end of the truck, Briggs prodded Dusk and made a flurry of those hand signals.  
Something moved in the shadows of the ruined building. Kelly glimpsed it through the empty window frames, moving through the shadows. She pointed, to it, and the Doctor gave her a worried look.  
Casper glanced around the corner of the truck. Slowly, as though moving through treacle, he reached down to his belt and took a stubby grenade from the strap. He weighed it in his hand, and gestured to Briggs he would toss it. As he did so, the second of his grenades fell free from his belt and bounced off the truck with a hollow clang.  
The tentacles of the shape in the building rose like serpents, and the Ghoul Plant let out a long howling cry. It lumbered towards the street with a surprising speed, the hefty bulk ploughing effortlessly through the rubble.  
The Doctor burst into activity. He rummaged in his pockets, dropping some bits and pieces onto the floor around him: a yo-yo, a deck of tarot cards, a packet of dried fish labelled in a language she didn’t understand, a bag of marbles, a circuit board, dog eared tickets to see the Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl, and… with a triumphant look the doctor produced a red cylinder of waxed paper that was caked in the lint of many years in his pocket, but had a look that said ‘dynamite’ a lot more than it ‘firework’.  
Kelly frowned at the Doctor.  
He gave her sheepish ‘I’ll explain later’ look in return, and gestured for her to stay put, as he darted out from the truck and ran to the mouth of a nearby alley. He jammed the dynamite into the grill of a manhole cover, and stamped his foot down on the cover.  
“Here Ghoulie-ghoulie-ghoulie!” The Doctor sang. “Here boy! Who’s a good genetically engineered genocide weapon? Is it you boy?”  
The creature burst from the building, through the shattered windows. Kelly got a fleeting glimpse of a twisted frame, covered in mossy flesh, a swarm of whipping tentacles barbed with rose thorns, a leathery skirt, and shapes bound to the trunk, mummified in wines and roots, that were vaguely, sickeningly…human.  
Tentacles whipped and lashed out, punching through the rusting trucks in search of prey. Briggs sprinted the length of the truck, and threw himself over Kelly, shielding her form the flailing assault. One of the tentacles lashed around the prisoner’s boot, and hoisted him away. Another caught Casper by the neck.  
Casper howled in agony as he was snatched away from cover.  
“No!” The Doctor screamed in frustration. “Not them! Me! I’m much tastier! I’m salt and vinegar flavoured!” He waved his hands. “Hello!”  
Dusk ran from the cover of the truck, caught the prisoner by his arm, and fired a burst of silenced bullets into the trunk of the Ghoul plant. They tore through the base of the tentacle and freed the prisoner. He adjusted his aim, and fired again, but was hit by a scything blow from another of the serpentine limbs, that drove him to the floor.  
Kelly’s blood froze, as Janus lost his grip on Casper, and the soldier was dragged away from him, into the shifting, undulating trunk of the plant. Vines and roots wrapped around the soldier, the mossy skin folded over him, and his screams choked away to nothing.  
Max opened fire, ripping several holes in the leathery hide of the monster, that did little to stop it. She darted to the cover of the truck, and fired rapid, concentrated bursts.  
A shrieking high-pitched steam whistle sound filled the street, and drowned out all else. Through the pain that fogged her thoughts, Kelly saw the Doctor holding up his sonic, like the Lady Liberty holding up her torch.  
The Ghoul Plant writhed and howled in a fury and lunged at the Doctor. The Doctor backed away, a few steps, drawing the creature towards him, then suddenly sprinted forwards and tumbled into an acrobatic roll under the flailing tentacles, past the monster, and into the cover of a doorway.  
The dynamite detonated beneath the creature, shaking the street and belching a ball of fire and smoke. The Ghoul Plant squawked and fell through the floor.  
When Kelly risked a look, she saw the manhole was gone, in its place a crater, a wound straight down into the sewers, that had swallowed the monster whole.  
The Doctor stooped, picked up the grenade that Casper had dropped, and plucked out the pin. He dropped it into the sewer with the same look on his face that Kelly had seen at funerals, the look of a mourner casting a handful of dirt onto the coffin.  
A dazzling white flash, and a sound like electrical arcing, silenced the screams of the Ghoul Plant.  
The Doctor swept his gaze over the soldiers. “Did any of you get cut by the thorns? Did they break the skin?”  
“No!” The Prisoner nodded at his ankle. “It only got my boot.”  
Janus shook his head, his shoulders slouching.  
“Dusk?” Briggs asked.   
“I…” Dusk’s voice was trembling. He reached up and touched his helmet and mask. There were deep gouges where the thorns had raked his helmet, revealing the ceramic of the armour.  
The Doctor studied them, and smiled. “No. They didn’t get to you.”  
“What happens if they did?” Kelly asked.  
“They poison you,” Briggs said. “It only takes a few minutes to kill you.”  
Kelly felt sick. “Do they have any other ways of killing you?”  
“Their spores,” the Doctor said, “are quite deadly parasites.”  
Kelly held up a hand. “I don’t want to know.”  
Max grabbed Dusk, and hauled him to his feet. “Did you want to get snatched too?”  
“Sorry,” Dusk said.  
She glowered at him, then the prisoner. “Is he worth it?”  
“I’m sorry…” Dusk repeated.  
Max snarled. “Casper’s gone, but we still have the bloody traitor. What if we lost you too? Huh?”  
Briggs caught Max, and eased her away from Dusk. “We still need to know who their contact was. We need to know if there are any more portals. If any more of those spore pods are going to find their way into the city.”  
Max nodded. Her body was still tight, her body language oozing fury. “It was Casper, Sir.”  
“I know.” Briggs barely whispered the word. “I know…”  
The Doctor wrapped an arm around Kelly. “Are you okay?”  
Kelly nodded.  
He looked at the floor. “Sorry. Had to take that dynamite off a cowboy. I was meant to be keeping it safe.”  
“What was that?” Kelly whispered.  
“The Ghoul Plant?” The Doctor sighed When he spoke again, there was a faint tremble to his voice. “It’s a weapon. A very nasty, very deadly weapon, from the nastiest and deadliest of wars.”  
Kelly dragged her friend into a hug. He looked like he needed it.  
“Who…” Kelly swallowed. “Who makes things like that?”  
“Daleks,” the Doctor said, grimly. 

FOUR

The transport droned overhead, and circled the rubble field, before landing in a storm of dust and engine wash. The heavily armoured hull reminded Kelly of a nautilus, if you squinted and used a little imagination.  
The loading ramp lowered, and the Doctor took her arm, guiding her up into the vessel. She took one of the seats on the long benches, dropping next to Max. The Soldier gave her a nod of greeting, as she unbuckled her helmet, and took off her gas mask.  
Beneath the helmet Max was beautiful: dark, refined, and elegant, if a little austere. She smiled at Kelly. “Hey.”  
“Hey,” Kelly said. “You don’t mind?”  
Max shook her head, and went back to wiping the dirt from her face.  
Kelly glanced around. Janus was a square jawed, grey haired soldier, hunched over with a look of mourning in his eyes. Briggs was the oldest of the squad, with a shaven head, and deep, intense eyes, and a nose that had been broken and flattened in some previous scuffle.  
Dusk was one of those people who should have been handsome, but wasn’t, maybe because of his haggard, drawn look, gaunt before his years, or the scars that mottled his cheeks, but mostly because of the way he carried himself, withdrawn and alone, even when he was surrounded by people. His hair was a tangled mess, and his eyes were haunted. When he took off his gas mask, he replaced it with a pair of glasses.  
He did not look at any of the others. He took a battered journal from his satchel, and sketched something with a stub of a pencil.  
The Doctor didn’t seem to notice that the young man was trying to be alone. He cheerfully sat next to Dusk, and looked over his shoulder.  
Kelly’s thoughts were full of Daleks. She’d seen them before, of course, everybody had, first on news footage of them flying around London, swarming around Canary Wharf, then on the night the sky changed, and the Earth was stolen to a distant galaxy. The Daleks had been in every town, on every street, rounding people up, exterminating any resistance, ruthlessly conquering the world.  
And now they were waging another war, on another world.  
Kelly stared at the prisoner, sat on the far bench. “You work for the Daleks?”  
The prisoner didn’t answer. His nostrils flared.  
“How?” Kelly asked. “How can you know what they do, and fight for them?”  
He stared at her. “Maybe I like the idea of a purer universe. One spared mistakes.”  
“Mistakes,” Kelly asked.  
“What do they call people like you, on your world?” The prisoner scoffed. “Boys wired up wrong, to think they’re girls?”  
“Excuse me,” the Doctor said, politely, “the correct word for a trans woman like Kelly is ‘woman’, usually preceded by ‘amazing’. I won’t let you hurt my friends, even with words.”  
He stood and loomed over the prisoner.  
“Oh?” The prisoner stared at the Doctor. “Do you think the Timelords are any better? Should I tell you what I know of…”  
His words trailed away, under the intensity of the Doctor’s stare.  
“What’s your name?” The Doctor said.  
“Nation,” the prisoner answered. “No. Do not use your tricks on me!”  
“Do you believe a single word you say?” The Doctor asked.  
“N…” Nation fought against his answer. “No? But… I must obey my masters. I must spread doubt and discontent when they are my only weapons. I must seek a way to fight back.”  
“Well stop it!” The Doctor said. “You are dangerously close to being off my Christmas card list, Nation. Don’t push your way onto my naughty list instead.”  
Nation opened his mouth, and shut it. He opened it again.  
The Doctor smiled. “That’s the problem with brainwashing. Once you open a mind to suggestion it stays open to other suggestions.” He beamed a smile at Kelly, as he sat back down.  
Max tried to smile, and almost managed it. “Your friend is very protective of you, isn’t he?”  
“He’s a friend,” Kelly whispered. “We look out for each other.”  
Max sighed, and glanced at Dusk. She stroked her hair.  
“I’m sorry,” Kelly said, “about… your other friend.”  
“Casper?” Max smiled. Her eyes were full of fond memories and fresh grief. “Me and Casper had each other’s back since the war began. I mean, we’re all close, and have been for what feels like forever, but…” She smiled a little. “I think maybe Casper was there before the war. Some of the few glimpses I have, are…”  
Kelly’s mind rushed to pick apart those few words, and sift the details. “You don’t remember the time before the war?”  
“None of us do,” Max said. “Or… not much, anyway. Some people say that it’s the way the war is being fought, through time corridors, and across the centuries. Others say it’s just the toll of the seven or eight years we’ve been fighting. You lose track of the past, as you lose track of hope. God knows, the last few years have been dragging their heels.” She paused. “I think it’s a blessing. I don’t want to know how much I lost. I don’t want to mourn them. Entire cities gone, continents left scorched, the earth salted by fall out and chemical weapons…”  
“Do you remember anything from before?” Kelly asked.  
Max paused. “Moments. Glimpses. A sunny day here, ice cream by the ocean. Picnicking on a rooftop with Casper, watching the fireworks…” She trailed off. “I never worked out if that was real, or if that was just wishful thinking.”  
Kelly stroked her hair and looked at Nation. He looked back, his eyes burning with malice.  
Briggs leant over to Kelly. “I’m guessing there’s no point asking what your mission is? It’s going to be need to know, right?”  
“Our mission?” Kelly asked.  
“Yeah.” Max said. “Timelords only turn up when pieces need moving across the board, or when they have a mission.” She looked at Briggs. “I’m guessing it’s about the Time Corridors the Daleks are using to move their assets around and get past the Helix, right?” She wore a knowing smile. “Your Lord wants to sneak onto the Dalek bridgeheads and do some subterfuge?”  
“We didn’t mean to end up here at all,” Kelly admitted. “Sorry.”  
“Figures,” Janus grumbled. “The Timelords dropped the last wave of reinforcements years ago, and haven’t deemed to see how were doing since.” He shot Dusk a look. “Frankly, I think we should the numpties they lumbered us with back, and ask for real soldiers.”  
Dusk didn’t respond.   
The Doctor picked up Dusk’s helmet and sniffed it. “Yes, well, our landing wasn’t planned and truth be told, we are a little lost. Where exactly are we?”  
“Cinderedge,” Briggs said. “Southern Sector. Universal Time Index Delta Delta One Seven Four.”  
The Doctor scraped the dirt from the helmet, and licked it off his fingers. “Right. And… you are sure about that? Seven Four?”  
“Of course,” Dusk said.  
The Doctor tapped his lips. “And you…” The Doctor stared at Dusk. “You were one of the reinforcements? Yes? You were brought here in a TARDIS?”  
“A type forty,” Dusk said. “I only saw it for a little while, but… You never forget that noise, do you? Of the time engines.”  
The Doctor stared at him. “How long ago was that?”  
“Four years,” Dusk said. “I had three years before that in the Cascades.”  
Kelly did some maths. Seven years in total. He could only have been a kid when he went to war, maybe sixteen, or seventeen. A troubling thought occurred to her. “So, where are you from, originally, I mean?”  
Dusk, closed his journal, and shook his head slightly.  
Nation smiled. “He doesn’t know. He doesn’t remember.” He opened his mouth to say more, but couldn’t make the words come out. He grunted. “Dammit.”  
“Hey,” Kelly said, with a smile. “That must mean you count as a friend, Dusk!”  
He nodded, and offered a weak, pale, attempt at a smile.  
Max kicked Nation. “Quit even trying that!”  
*  
In the control room Jenn was hunched over her console, nursing a mug of synthetic coffee. She looked up at the Admiral.  
“Visitors secured,” Jenn reported, “and on a transport. They will be here in a few hours.”  
“Excellent,” Arbay said. “Most excellent news.”  
Jenn paused a moment. “With your permission I will contact High Command and inform them…”  
“No.” Arbay smiled at her. “I will inform them. After all, it is a matter of the Timelords.”  
He walked off the command floor and into his office, touching the control panel to ensure the large glass walls turned opaque with a frosted pattern. The locks in the door cycled with a mechanical hiss.  
His desk was a single piece of tinted glass, seamlessly curving up from the floor and spreading out in a leaf shape. He placed his hand on the desk, and the glass glowed with an inner light. The rest of the room dimmed, velvet rich shadows creeping over the walls.  
The shadows formed a figure, tall and angular.  
“My master!” Arbay bowed his head. “The Timelords have…”  
“No.” The Shadow spoke in an ancient, airless voice. “I have sent you a Timelord, the Doctor, an old enemy of mine who will be… useful… He holds the key to the Artefact.”  
“He will never aid in your plan,” Arbay said. “He will try to stop us.”  
“On the contrary,” the Shadow said, in a velvet smooth way, “you will tell him all about the Helix Field, and he will endeavour to retrieve the artefact, to save your world.”  
“Your will,” Arbay said, bowing, “will be done.”  
  
FIVE

The spire loomed over the horizon. A tall white needle, stretching out of a heavily fortified complex in the middle of the wastelands, up to the cloud choked sky, crowned by docking pylons and platforms.  
The transport banked around the tower, and latched onto the docking clamps. The loading ramp stretched down to a pair of heavy doors. The Doctor took Kelly by the arm, and guided her down the ramp and into the pleasant, airy, lobby that could have belonged in the reception space for any solicitor’s office.  
A smart woman, in a freshly pressed uniform. She introduced herself as Sub-Lieutenant Jenn, an Operations Officer. While the others escorted Nation to the brig, Jenn escorted the Doctor and Kelly to a briefing room, where they were given coffee (or something masquerading as coffee) and ration packs.  
“The Admiral will be with us shortly,” Jenn said.  
“Ah.” The Doctor smiled. “Would you mind if I had a few moments with my companion?”  
“Of course,” Jenn smiled. “I will wait out in the corridor.”  
The Doctor was all smiles as he escorted her to the door, then suddenly turned and held Kelly in a cold despairing stare. “Something is very, very, wrong here.”  
Kelly had never seen the Doctor afraid before. It chilled her spine.  
The Doctor put his hands in his pockets. “We aren’t meant to be here. The Time War, the great war across the aeons, and across countless stars, was meant to be sealed, scabbed over so nothing comes in or out. We shouldn’t have been able to come back here.”  
“The Time War?” Kelly muttered.  
“Between my people, and the Daleks,” the Doctor said. “It broke the universe. Terrible factions rose out of the ashes, there was chaos, despair, and endless destruction.”  
“And somebody brought us here?” Kelly asked.  
“It gets worse,” the Doctor assured her. “Cinderedge should not be here. It should have fallen years ago. The Timelords sent reinforcements, but they were too late. The world had burned away, and broken apart.”  
Kelly put her fingers to her lips. “So… history is changing?”  
“It’s in flux, to an extent,” the Doctor said, gravely. “The rules went out the window with the war. If a planet becomes a stronghold for one side, the other would go back a century or two, and implode the sun, or bombard it with nano-swarms, or…”  
“I get the picture,” Kelly said. “When should they have been…lost?”  
“Well,” the Doctor puffed out his cheek. “Dusk says its been four years since he came here with the reinforcements, but…” He shook his head. “He has fifty year’s worth of contamination in his helmet and clothes. Those ruins had been mouldering for decades. Everything is… wrong.” He tapped his head. “I can feel time being stretched.” He snapped his fingers. “Of course! That energy field around the planet! They called it a Helix field? Oh, stupid, silly, numpty Doctor! It’s a Paradox Helix! Ha! Yes! But… Why?”  
The door hissed open. A burly, jowly, bull of a man stepped in. He bowed his head.  
“My Lord,” the Admiral said. “I am Arbay, commander of this facility. My resources are at your disposal.”  
The Doctor nodded. “Arbay! An Admiral. Must be a tough job this far inland? Anyway, I couldn’t help noticing you have a very impressive Paradox Helix activated around this planet. Might I ask a few questions like: how? Why? And did you know how terribly dangerous that is?”  
“Yes.” Arbay gave the Doctor a sheepish look. “I know the Timelords refuse to use such weapons, but… the decision was made in our darkest hour, and I am afraid the consequences have been all too tragic, but we have no choice.” He shook his head. “If we lower the field, the Dalek Armada will wipe us out. We know they have Omega bombs aimed at us. And while it is up… we condemn our people to an eternity of unending horrors.”  
The Doctor was taken aback. “I… see. Sorry. You aren’t going to deny it? Make excuses?”  
“No.” Arbay said, earnestly. “It is why you are here, isn’t it?”  
“Can you tell us what happened?” Kelly asked.  
“I can do better than that,” Arbay said, evenly. “I can show you.”  
*  
The regrets, sorrows, and grief caught up with Dusk as soon as he entered his modest suite of rooms. He ran to the sink heaving and gagging, retching up his rations. Countless unwanted memories clouded his thoughts, taunting him. The times he had pulled the trigger, the feel of the gun in his hand, the pounding of his heart, the dizzying pain as the tentacle swatted at him.  
Did he truly remember the look of realisation in the shock-trooper’s eyes as he pulled the trigger, or had he imagined it?  
He drew a glass of water, and washed the taste from his mouth. He tried not to look at the reflection in the mirror, to see all the faded marks and scars on his body.  
Eventually the nausea passed, and he lay on his bed, flicking through his journal, at the rough sketches of village greens, pleasant church yards, rolling fields and viaducts that had burned too fleetingly and rarely in his dreams. The pictures did not quite capture the glimpses he had of home (wherever that had been), but they stirred faint echoes in the back of his mind.  
Echoes so ethereal they threatened to be lost.  
His wrist console chimed.  
Trying his best to hide his exhaustion, Dusk accepted the call.  
“Yes,” he croaked.  
Jenn’s image filled the small, blue-washed screen. “Corporal. You have new orders.”  
“Ma’am,” Dusk said, tapping the icon to accept his new assignment.  
*  
The elevator whooshed its way down the centre of the Spire, a moving pattern of lights on the wall representing the floors rushing by. Kelly stood to one side with Dusk, who had made a game, if hurried, attempt to smarten himself up, with a fresh set of fatigues and a comb through his hair. On the other side, the Doctor stood with Admiral Arbay. The Doctor was holding the lapels of his coat, and making lots of knowing expressions with his ever-moving eyebrows.  
“Crikey,” the Doctor said, with a smile. “They don’t give you much time for a rest, do they?”  
Arbay spoke before Dusk could answer. “The Corporal is blessed with abilities that make him particularly suited to our current endeavour. They are quite rare.”  
“And not,” Kelly suggested, “the need for a cup of coffee and a comfy bed?”  
“A meal that didn’t come from a ration pack?” The Doctor suggested.  
Dusk looked at Kelly, and smiled in a way that suggested he wasn’t always allowed to want such things. No doubt for the greater good. What he actually said was: “I am honoured to be trusted with your safety, ma’am.”  
Kelly smiled. “Okay then. What abilities?”  
Dusk looked away. “I am… sensitive to certain distortions in the fabric of time.”  
“But only some,” the Doctor noted. “You… are a Witchfinder?”  
“I…” Dusk faltered. “I was never comfortable with that word.”  
“What does that mean?” Kelly asked.  
Arbay again hurried to talk before Dusk could: “He can sense time corridors and rifts, the presence of time vessels, when they let the past or the future spill into the present.”  
“Things like Daleks,” the Doctor said, “or Ghoul Plants.”  
Kelly was about to ask if that meant Dusk was any more aware of how long he had been fighting the war for, but the Doctor gave her a warning shake of the head. Dusk caught the exchange, but said nothing.  
Araby continued with his explanation. “It also makes Dusk less likely to suffer the hallucinations or waking nightmares that others report while guarding the…er… source of our Paradox Helix.”  
“The what?” Kelly asked.  
“Visions,” the Doctor said. “If you see anything… unusual down there, just remember it isn’t real.”  
“Visions of what?” Kelly squeaked.  
“Nothing that can hurt you,” the Doctor promised. “Not physically, anyway.”  
After an awkward silence, the elevator doors opened. They stepped out onto a platform built onto a natural shelf of rock, in a vast, airy, cavern. Walkways and staircases crossed the cavern, surrounding and connecting to the hull of a wrecked spaceship. It was vaguely insectile in shape, the overlapping armour plates and segmented design suggesting a dragonfly the size of an aircraft carrier.  
The Doctor leant on the railings and looked over the side, whistling appreciatively. “Cor! Kelly! Come and look at this! They don’t make ‘em like this anymore!”  
Kelly walked towards the railing.  
It isn’t right! The words bubbled unwanted in her head. She put her hands on the railing, and looked at the Doctor. Her friend smiled at her, and Kelly smiled back. She smiled like she wasn’t thinking about her father, about the smell of beer on his breath, on how his rough fingers felt against her throat, as he pinned her to drywall.  
She forced the memories down, and concentrated on being amazed by the ancient spaceship impossibly buried under millions of year’s worth of rock. This, she decided, is pretty damned amazing. It’s what travelling with the Doctor is all about. It’s what is worth all the monsters and the bullets, the frankly annoying habit of finding himself nose deep in trouble. He probably couldn’t go to the convenience store for ice-cream without finding a cyberman (ugh, those are horrid) lurking in the aisle. She brightened her smile. It’s why he needs a friend like me.  
Dusk put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Whatever you thought you heard was just an illusion.”  
Kelly jumped at the touch, and resisted the urge to hit him. He was, she realised, trying to be kind. “Sure,” she said, marching boldly ahead down the steps. “So, Arbay, what’s all this about?”  
“Good question!” The Doctor rubbed his hands together. “Who doesn’t love a woman with a good question?”  
*  
Nation waited patiently in his cell, his fingers steepled, his eyes staring through the blank concrete wall. He rose to his feet six seconds before the door opened, and the Dalek’s agent within the Spire presented herself to him.  
Jenn stared at the shock-trooper. “The Cinderedge forces believe they destroyed the spore pods before they could be dispersed into stock deliveries. Are they correct in that assessment?”  
Nation nodded.  
Jenn paused. Her eyes went out of focus, and glowed with an inner blue light as she conferred with her masters, and new orders were decided upon. She placed her hand to Nation’s cheek. He felt the cold presence of the data network opening in the back of his mind, the pertinent information being shared. He saw footage from the security feeds, of the Timelord (the Doctor, now confirmed) talking about the historical anomaly. We should have already been victorious. The orders passed to the Witchfinder to escort the Timelord to restricted levels beneath the Spire.  
Nation understood his orders.  
Jenn handed him a uniform and side arm that would not draw attention.  
  
SIX

Arbay opened the airlock to the insectile ship and lead the way into the gleaming white interior. Kelly followed behind the Doctor. The interior was cool, and tasted of antiseptic. A thin layer of silver vapour coiled around her feet. The walls and floor were of a material she hadn’t seen before. Not plastic, or glass, but somehow a little like both, with a silk smooth touch.  
Dusk followed behind.  
The Doctor looked at Kelly, and smiled. “A Vortex Ship.”  
“So…” Dusk shrugged. “It’s like a TARDIS?”  
“It’s like a TARDIS the way a fly is like a bird,” the Doctor said. “It was built to sail through the Time Space Vortex, but it evolved down completely different branches, with completely different methods and mechanisms.” He smiled at her. “A ship of the Mayfly Empire.”  
“The who?” Kelly whispered.  
“Oh,” the Doctor answered, “a very ancient kingdom, that conquered a few star systems and were a pretty big deal for a while. Pretty inevitable when you have the power to make ships like this. They powered their entire Empire from the vortex, syphoning off limitless renewable energy. The only problem was, their shields weren’t good enough. The Paradox Helix had some nasty little side effects to prolonged exposure, like… well…”  
“Long decades passing that people thought were a few years?” Kelly asked in a low voice.  
The Doctor glanced at Dusk, then nodded.  
“What…” Dusk frowned. “What does that mean?”  
Arbay sighed. “I didn’t have any choice, Doctor.”  
“No…” The Doctor’s tone carried centuries of sadness. “No. I very much doubt you did.” He pointed down a corridor. “This way to the bridge, is it?” The Doctor marched off at a pace, taking long strides through the ship. “Keep up Kelly! You too Dusty.”  
“Dusk!” The young man shouted.  
Kelly sighed. “He doesn’t like to be corrected.”  
Arbay followed after the Doctor. “Doctor! Wait! Listen to me…”  
Kelly smiled at Dusk, and hurried after the Doctor. She followed the whine of his sonic through the maze of corridors. As she rounded one of the elegant, almost biological curve, she screeched to a halt.  
The ship had gone.  
In its place was the yard behind her father’s single storey white timber house, in a grassy, shady suburb of small-town California, dappled by trees, and clad in stars and stripes for July Fourth. Her Dad was wearing his apron, sweaty and greasy from the grill, and far too drunk. He grabbed her throat, and drove her against the wall. “Pride? Pride!” He scoffed. “Look at you! If you want to talk to me about Pride, go and sign up for one of the forces. Go catch a bullet somewhere and die, so I can have something to be proud about my son, and not…see… this… this…”  
“Dad,” Kelly had said, back that day, “I love you.”  
He punched her. “It isn’t right! It isn’t normal! It’s…” He realised the rest of the family, the friends, the neighbours were all staring at them. His fist hovered, and he let her go. “Pathetic. You’re pathetic. I don’t have a son.”  
He let Kelly go and she dropped to the floor-  
But this time Dust caught her. He let her find her footing, and gently brushed the tear from her cheek.  
“It was just a memory,” he said. “They can’t hit you, or…” He stopped. “They can cause no physical harm. Do you need a moment?”  
Kelly lifted his hands away. “Physical harm…” She smiled. “Just heartbreak and sorrow.” She composed herself. “I’ll be okay. That was a scar I’ve had ripped off a few times over the year. We should go and find the Doctor.”  
She took a few steps, stopped, then looked at Dusk. She put his hand back on her shoulder, and let him guide her on. He squeezed her, slightly.  
*  
The Doctor was waltzing around the bridge, his sonic waving, waving the computers and instruments from their slumber. He studied the swarms of holographic displays, his lips pursed, and his eyes burning.  
As Kelly and Dusk joined them, the Doctor shot her one of his ‘are you okay?’ looks, that gave her a fuzzy glow in her chest. Kelly nodded, chewing on her lip.  
The Doctor changed his smile to the ‘I’m about to be dead impressive’ kind, and raised a finger at Arbay. “Right. You. I’m going to make some educated guesses, and then you are going to fill in the details I don’t know. Okay?”  
Arbay nodded. “I can explain.”  
“Nope.” The Doctor span about on his toes. “Right. Dusty, listen very carefully, and you are going to want to ask questions, but you won’t, yet, because I will be on a flow, and you won’t want to derail my train of thought. Now…” The Doctor leant on one of the consoles. “Once upon a time, you were in the middle of the Time War, and you were given some pretty terrible orders. Hold this planet, to the last man, woman, or robot, because, somebody somewhere, thinking of war like a game of chess, decided that every Dalek, every trooper, every enemy looking at you, was not looking at one of the other thousand or so fronts of the war. You fought hard, but sooner or later the Daleks decided you were more trouble than you were worth, and got ready to burn this entire planet to a crisp. All those bombs aimed at you. But…” The Doctor prodded at the controls with his sonic. When they didn’t do what he wanted he snatched Dusk’s side arm from the young man’s holster and hammered at the controls. Some red icons turned green, but the gun broke. The Doctor tossed it carelessly over his shoulder. “Then somehow, you were told this place existed, and you dug down to find the ship. Or maybe you knew it was here, and somebody told you how to work this ship. Either way, you found a way to power up the Paradox Helix, the power core of the ship, but crucially, you were told how to turn the temporal-phase shields down…” He tutted. “And that seemed a brilliant idea, as it blocked time ships from reaching you from orbit, and is protecting you from the infernal outcome that history remembers you for.”  
“We survived!” Arbay snapped.  
“At a cost, you already admitted that,” the Doctor said. “Not just stretching time, meaning you have squeezed…” His eyes widened at the display. “Blimey! Poor Dusty here thinks he has served in this Hell of a war for four years, but… he’s been here for sixty seven years! Sixty seven! And because his memory is being clouded and eroded, he has no idea!”  
“Nobody does!” Arbay snapped. “Nobody but a select few.”  
“But,” the Doctor said, holding up a finger, “you have a bigger problem! The Daleks! Now they know something has let you do this, and they have been looking for ways to get their grubby little sucker arms on this ship. They can’t break through very easily, but they can still fight a war here, with expendable forces. The armies that thought siding with the Daleks would stave off their own extermination. The traitors, the clones, the robomen, and living weapons.”  
“Ghoul Plants,” Arbay agreed, “Slithers, Vargas, Swarm Lice, blue-plague, and… so many other horrors.”  
“Anything they can throw at you,” the Doctor agreed, “to keep the war alive, to give them a chance to break the Helix Field, so they can swarm in themselves and take it.”  
The Doctor sonic-ed another console. This time a display opened, showing the hundred, thousands, of ships that sat in orbit around Cinderedge, waiting to conquer it.   
Kelly quivered with fear. When Dusk squeezed her shoulder again, she didn’t complain.  
“And…” Dusk cleared his throat. “No offence, but… Arbay did all this, did he?”  
“Ah!” The Doctor clapped his hands. “No. I don’t really think so, but that is a very good question! He’s an Admiral, which means he has people. Admirals, Brigadiers, and Emperors always have people… But he gave the orders, didn’t he?”  
“I did,” Arbay said.  
“And… where are your people?” The Doctor asked. “Seems a little odd they aren’t here to meet the Timelord who is here to save the day, and will undoubtedly have a lot of technical questions.”  
Arbay snorted. “As it happens, yes I did do this.”  
The Doctor stared at the admiral. “You did?”  
“Yes!” Arbay said, loudly. “And as it happens, I resent the supposition that an experienced naval officer, who has commanded entire fleets of interstellar ships, couldn’t learn his way around the helm of…”  
The Doctor flicked the sonic, and the lights went out. He raised a challenging eyebrow. “Turn them back on.”  
Arbay folded his arms. “Are we playing games now?”  
“Go on!” The Doctor said. “Point to the right panel to flick the lights back on.”  
Arbay held up his hands. “I don’t know where the light switch is.”  
“And yet,” Kelly said, “you could experiment with the shields and the engines, and not kill everybody?”  
“See!” The Doctor beamed. “She has the best questions. How’d you do it, Arbay?”  
Arbay smiled. “I asked nicely.”  
He walked to the back wall, and touched it. The wall rippled like a liquid, and shifted, revealing a room beyond, as large as the bridge, but containing only a single crystal, roughly the size of a credit card, suspended in a column of light, spinning slowly.  
“Wowzer!” The Doctor said, running over to the crystal, putting his glasses on, and peering at it. “Oh… that is… Cor!”  
Kelly and Dusk shared a look.  
Dusk cleared his throat. “What is it, Doctor?”  
The Doctor tapped his lips. “That is… a computer. A really, really, clever computer. Which is to say that it is very stupid. That’s the thing about computers. They are only clever in very narrow ways, and they tend to be really, really, stubborn. What they are really bad at is intuition and imagination. They can solve problems by brute force, discovering millions of solutions to any problem at any one time, but a really smart computer, will always know what the problems are, that need solving, by integrating one very special component… A person!”  
Arbay nodded. “Indeed. I touched that, and it touched my mind. We melded and… it understood what I needed.”  
“Ah!” The Doctor said. “And now it’s in your head, using your spare memory space, to run billions and trillions of calculations, every microsecond. To adjust and counter…” He stopped. “Slight problem…” He looked at Arbay. “No offence, Admiral, but unless you are a very empty headed man, that is a lot of processing power to cram into the nooks and crannies of a mortal noggin, and I’m just trying to work out how you didn’t burn your mind away?”  
Arbay nodded. “And now you begin to understand the crux of my problem.”  
Kelly opened her mouth to answer, but the Doctor glanced at her, and nodded at Dusk.  
“He…” Dusk’s expression opened into horror. “He… spread it out between all of us. Across the entire world. He… took a little bit of everybody… This… is why we have been here for so long, but only think it was a few years…”  
“Yes,” the Doctor whispered. “And how did you manage that, Arbay?”  
Arbay snorted. “I just… worked it out. Now, even if we were free of the Dalek menace, and weren’t about to all be sent to oblivion, even if I could free my people from the influence of the Helix Field, then we do at the risk of harming, or even killing the entire population.”  
Kelly shot Arbay an evil look. “I assume that it is a lot easier to put the computer into a mind than to take it out again?”  
*  
Nation crouched in the bridge of the alien vessel, and listened to the Doctor’s conversation.  
He drew his pistol and checked the magazine. Beside him Jenn powered her phased energy pistol. Her eyes shone.  
The Daleks had given their orders.  
  
SEVEN

For a long time, the Doctor stood, his nose almost touching the shaft of light in which the crystal was suspended, watching it closely, his eyes aglow with inner thought. Kelly watched the Doctor, patiently waiting for the frantic burst of energy when an idea hit him.  
“Doctor,” she said. “Can we do this?”  
“We?” He sighed. “If I had two, or three other Timelords we could do this no problem. I could probably do it myself, but it will be risky, and I need to make sure my mind is the right shape before I try…” He pursed his lips. “It’s tricky. Nobody wants to be the fuse that blows if I get this wrong.”  
Dusk stepped closer. “Doctor…”  
“Hmm?” The Doctor said, without looking up.  
Dusk looked at his feet. “What if we directed the crystal to seek its processing space somewhere else first, would that buy us the time to...”  
“That,” the Doctor said, with a smile, “is why we need either three average Timelords, or one particularly brilliant me.” He pursed his lips. “Unless you have a better idea?”  
Nation stepped into the doorway, his gun levelled at Arbay. “I do!” He tutted. “No, Admiral, do not move, or I will shoot. Nobody move.”  
Jenn followed him, her energy pistol pointed at the Doctor.  
The Doctor groaned. “Oh, not now…”  
“The Artefact,” Jenn said, “will be given new instructions. It will sever the connections to all humans, and lower the shields.”  
“That,” the Doctor said, “would kill everybody.”  
“And,” Jenn agreed, “leave the artefact unprotected. It will belong to the Daleks.”  
“Never,” the Doctor said.  
Dusk stepped between Jenn and the Doctor. “Ma’am, if there is any part of you that is still Jenn, you must…”  
The energy pistol was pressed to his head. Jenn smiled. “Oh, do shut up.”  
Dusk stared at her.  
Kelly stared at the Doctor. He gestured, slightly, with his fingers for her to stay still. With the other hand, he had lifted his sonic screwdriver from his pocket.  
“I think,” the Doctor said, “there is something left of the real Jenn, and the real Nation, from before the Daleks reprogrammed them.” He buzzed the sonic. “Shall we see?”  
For Nation the present melted away, and he was on the prison planet again, hungry, whipped, desperate. He would do anything to be free of the chains that ate at his ankle, and the long toil of the mine.  
Anything.  
The Shock Trooper stood over him, and raised the barbed whip.  
Nation dropped to his knees and screamed.  
For Jenn the past filled her mind in the form of a sterile silver room. Two Daleks swept through the room, and began operating the controls.  
Jenn struggled to move, she begged, she pleaded, but the restraints on her wrists and over her head, held her firm, and the drugs had turned her muscles to jelly.  
The machine overhead sprang to life, and the long, silver, drill bit descended towards her eye with a high pitched squeal.  
Jenn collapsed against the wall, sobbing.  
Kelly was thrown back against the wall of her father’s house. Calloused fingers crushed her throat. Dusk snapped her from the memory, his hands on her cheeks.  
“Ma’am,” he said, “look at me.”  
Arbay dropped to the floor, gasping for breath. “No! You…are… not…real!”  
The Doctor flicked off his sonic. “Sorry. Sorry, I know… I just needed to give these two a short sharp shock.” He leant over Nation. “Now. Why don’t you tell me your Dalek access codes?”  
Nation blinked back to reality and started spitting control codes at the Doctor.  
“And you!” The Doctor snapped at Jenn, in his commanding voice. “Their Psionic Impulse Network Frequencies?”  
Jenn blinked back to reality, and started reciting a long string of numbers.  
“Conditioning!” The Doctor said, grinning at Kelly and Dusk. “Kelly?”  
“I’m okay,” Kelly said. “Dusk had me.”  
The Doctor smiled. “Good! Good! Now… technically I’m supposed to put history back on track, but seeing as that would mean rewinding several years, and letting this world burn, I am going to do the next best thing, and disable this mess. The planet will be back in the war and will have to make its own chances. Agreed?”  
“Agreed,” Arbay said. “But there is the little problem of the Dalek invasion force up there in orbit.”  
“You say problem…” The Doctor said. “And I say solution.”  
He stepped over to the crystal, and closed his fist around it.  
*  
The Black Dalek rolled onto the command deck of the battle cruiser. It swung about to address the Overseer Dalek stationed at the observation console. “Report!”  
The Overseer Dalek adjusted the display on its console. “The Helix Field Is Condensing And Fading.”  
“Have Our Agents Taken Control?”  
“Negative.”  
“Warn All Ships. Raise Shields. Prepare For…” The Black Dalek paused. “You Will Heed My Orders. You Will Obey.”  
The Overseer Dalek did not seem to be listening. It was staring upwards, its lights pulsating in a hypnotic rhythm. The Black Dalek sent commands through the network, but felt more and more of its subordinates going offline. The Daleks on the bridge were all now lost, to the hypnotic rhythm.  
The Black Dalek had to… that was odd… it couldn’t think… It was struggling to…what was it doing? It couldn’t quite remember…  
And then it too, like it’s entire fleet, was entirely consumed by the thoughts of the crystal, calculating how to disperse the energy of the Helix field, in such a way that it would do maximum damage to the Dalek fleet, and minimal damage to the planet, at the same time as it calculated how to surgically remove the influence of the crystal from the population of Cinderedge, and to safely shut the ship down into hibernation, and remove the crystal so it could not be activated again.  
It all took a fraction of a second, and as the Helix shield detonated out into orbit, with such force as to scatter the atoms of the Dalek fleet across the entire cosmos and many centuries of time, the Black Dalek had no idea what was happening.  
*  
The Doctor released his grip on the crystal and fell away. Dusk and Kelly caught the Timelord as he flopped into their arms, his mouth, nose and ears smoking, his eyes out of focus.  
Kelly brushed the floppy hair away from the Timelord’s face, her heart thumping in her chest. She felt for his pulse, and was relieved when the double beat fluttered under her fingertips. “Doctor?”  
“I need a moment,” the Doctor gasped.  
The crystal clattered to the floor. Nation lunged for it, but Arbay put his foot on the crystal and levelled a gun each at each of the Dalek Agents. He smiled at them. “No.”  
“Sir,” Dusk said, quietly, “I think you should give that to the Doctor.”  
Arbay shook his head. “This goes to Central Command. While we have this, it is in the interest of the Timelords to send us those reinforcements and protect this planet.”  
“Ooh!” The Doctor said, jumping to his feet. “Crafty! I like it!” He smiled. “I really like it. Of course, you understand, that I will be watching, and you will not… you will not… use this, or abuse it, or I will be back?”  
“Understood,” Arbay said.  
The Doctor smiled at the Dalek Agents. “Now… would you be so kind as to put your hands up, and try not to do anything stupid for a little while?”  
Dusk squeezed Kelly’s shoulder. “Are you okay?”  
She nodded, and smiled. “Yeah. Those nightmares aren’t anything I haven’t had to learn how to deal with.”  
Dusk nodded, and stroked her cheek. “Whoever you saw, doesn’t deserve the power they have on you.”  
Kelly smiled. “No, they do not.”  
*  
The transport hummed through the sky.  
Kelly sat by the window, curled against the Doctor, his arm around her shoulders. He was watching the view of the wasteland, the occasional carrion bird flock, or Ghoul Plant the only signs of life.  
“The war is a long way from over,” Kelly whispered, “isn’t it?”  
The Doctor nodded.  
“And…” She hesitated. “Who wins?”  
“Nobody,” the Doctor decided. “This world has the same chances as anywhere else in the war, and history will adapt. It’ll still end up with the same result in the end, with the same losses, the same destruction, the same… waste.” He gave Kelly a serious look. “The war is sealed for a reason. That at least means any little ripples and mistakes I made will be…contained.”  
Kelly looked between the soldiers. Her eyes settled on Dusk. “He wasn’t even meant to be here.”  
“Nobody was,” the Doctor said.  
“He was reinforcements,” Kelly said. “You told me they weren’t meant to find the world.”  
The Doctor sighed. “What is it you want, Kelly?”  
“Sixty something years?” She whispered. “He must have earned a chance at something better. Can’t we…”  
“Oh. I see.” The Doctor smiled. “Well… he did try to get the Admiral to do the smart thing with the crystal, and I suppose he did try to be brave, with a gun pointed at him, and… he did look after you when the ship was affecting you, but I pretty much made up my mind when he decided that even the lowest, dirtiest, Dalek-iest life needed saving.”  
“Made up your mind?” Kelly asked.  
The Doctor nodded. “You have to wash him, clean him, walk him, and keep him away from guns.” He raised his voice. “Dusk! I’m going to need a little help when I get to the TARDIS. I don’t suppose you wanted another look an old type forty?”  
Kelly laughed, and hugged the Doctor close.  
*  
The Shadow looked at the crystal that Arban held over the desk.  
“Well?” Arban asked.  
The Shadow chuckled a dry, rasping, voice. “Well my friend, I will send somebody to collect you, and you will deliver that to me.”  
“And then?” Arban demanded.  
“And then…” the Shadow whispered. “We shall begin.”


End file.
